Listen To Your Heart
by peanutbutter126
Summary: She taught him how to love and in return he kept her human. GaaSaku.


I do not own Naruto or any of its characters.

This was written with a friend in mind, SakuBloss.

Anyway, this is a GaaSaku. My friend apparently likes this pairing. My first try at it, so I'm sorry if the characters are OOC.

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Listen To Your Heart

_Badump… badump…_

She could feel it beating. The heart. The one which belonged to the man whose chest she had thrust her scalpel into. Her arm was tangled in torn flesh up to her wrist. Those eyes (_blue, they just had to be bloody blue)_ were fixed on her face, wide, horrified. Disbelief. Killed at the hands of a girl. Just like his comrades.

Penetrating the defences hadn't been a challenge at all. What would a handful of rogue nin, exhausted from days of frenzied escape, think of a young woman, lithe, beautiful, obviously distressed? They had welcomed her with open arms, embraced her. Embraced their downfall, their death.

Her grip tightened, chakra sharpened into a deadly blade, and she wrenched her arm out. The man's eyes went wide as ruptured vessels traced paths in them. Her arm came free with a sickening crunch, and just as her fingers were slipping out, there was a meaty sucking sound, as if the body was unwilling to release her. Crimson poured from the open mouth, flecking against her cheek, spilling onto her torn dress. Those eyes went glazed, but she could have sworn that they were still focused on her, remembering her, as she stepped back and the body keeled over her feet.

Sakura Haruno looked around at the carnage she had wrought. The camp was a wreck. Her chakra fizzled out, leaving her fingers tingling with the faint vestiges and the warmth of the heart of the man she had just killed. Counted the bodies. Seven. There were seven.

There were supposed to be eight. The watchman. The guard. The last she had seen of him, he had been on his way to the bathroom. In the desert, the 'bathroom' was the nearest vegetation that could hide a grown man and his privates. Sakura knew where the closest qualifiable bathroom was, and she closed her eyes, smiled tiredly.

The hollow _crack_ of crushed bones and the bloodcurdling scream that followed rose into the night and blanketed the area in a baptism of a successful mission.

Sakura wearily staggered over to the collapsed tent. Sat down, leaned against the snapped poles. The dress Temari had lent her was in rags. They barely held together, but Sakura knew that even if she could somehow miraculously stitch the cloth back together, she would never be able to wash out the splashes of crimson seeped into the fabric. She wasn't even sure if she could wash it off her own skin.

She closed her eyes, closed them on the wreckage, the bodies, and heaved out a deep breath. She waited. How long would it take him? Would he even come?

"I see the mission was a success."

That was _not_ a smile her lips were curving into. Sakura opened her eyes, stared into the ones that were fixed on hers. She followed them as they flickered down and narrowed.

"You're bleeding."

She raised her arm so that she could inspect the horrid gash in her side. Blood bubbled at the tears. "It's not as bad as it looks," she told him. "I was careless."

He held her gaze. Was his brow furrowing? "Careless," he repeated.

"Yes, Gaara, careless."

"I told you to be careful, did I not?"

She snorted. "And I told _you_ to leave everything to me, didn't I?" But he came. He always came. And secretly, she liked it.

"I was patrolling." It was always patrolling. Always.

"Ah… the village is so fortunate to have such a _diligent_ Kazekage," Sakura said teasingly. She knew him well enough to accurately interpret the twitch of his eye as an equivalent to a scowl. It made her laugh. But the amusement and elation did not last long. Sakura winced almost immediately, hand fluttering to her wound. Clutched it, filtered the remnants of her chakra, did her best to knit the damage.

Gaara watched. He crouched down in front of her and watched. He stared unmovingly at her injury, her blood. Then she ran out of chakra, and as she hissed a curse, he glanced into her eyes. "Does it hurt?"

"Do you think it does?"

He continued to stare at her, silently demanding. Sakura sighed. "Yes. Yes, it does. It hurts."

He nodded. "The medic group is ten minutes behind me. In the meantime," he reached into his pouch and pulled out a small roll of bandages, "these will suffice."

"Prepared, aren't you?" Sakura held her hand out for them, but Gaara gave a small shake of his head and began unravelling the roll himself. She raised an eyebrow. "Exactly who is the qualified medic-nin here?" But she let him hold her up as he passed the bandages under, and decided that she would never tell him that his hand was very warm, very human, and that she liked his touch.

"I remember what you taught me," Gaara said. And it seemed like he did, because his binding was firm and well-layered, and the blood no longer seeped through immediately. "And also, _you_ appear to be the patient, Sakura."

She scowled, but then he pressed a little harder than necessary, and she hissed in pain. His expression remained impassive. His arm drew her closer, and by the time he was slipping the ends into a knot, her head was rested on his shoulder and she was practically cradled in his lap. He was silent. One hand gently ran along the thick bandages, his fingers fluttering as if he could still feel the laceration.

"Were you worried?" she whispered.

"I was patrolling."

"I'm sorry."

"I told you; I was patrolling."

They sat in silence for a long moment. Sakura let her eyes close and exhaled deeply, relaxing her beaten body. She was tired. In all modesty, a handful of rogue nin should not pose as a particularly difficult challenge to a jounin like Sakura Haruno. Usually, that was the case. Except lately, Sakura found herself distracted, taking things for granted. Like the fact that she would never have to fear an ambush, because she knew a vicious plume of sand would tear apart any hazard.

His arm wound protectively around her.

She could hear his heart beating, could feel it through his shirt. It beat slower than that of the man she had killed. It was calm, reassuring. This intimacy was a commendable step for Gaara; in the beginning, he had only stared at her in wonder from a distance, never touching her. He had been afraid then, afraid that she was so fragile, so easily breakable, that he had to treat her with utter delicateness.

"Sakura." His voice was quiet, calm. _Badump…_

"Yes?"

_Badump… badump…_

"Be more careful next time."

"Hai."

Sakura smiled and listened, because the heart never lied.


End file.
